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| Caucasus/Russia/Central Asia |
| Caucasus Corpse Count |
| 2005-09-19 |
| A RUSSIAN interior ministry soldier was killed overnight by automatic arms fire in Nalchik, the capital of the Kabardino-Balkaria republic in the North Caucasus. Unknown assailants opened fire on a group of soldiers patrolling the Gornaya suburb, killing one soldier and injuring another, the Interfax agency cited the interior ministry as reporting. Two months ago two police officers were shot dead in the same area. Kabardino-Balkaria is prone to instability as are other Caucasus republics bordering Chechnya. President Valeri Kokov, who had led the republic for 20 years, resigned lasted week, officially for health reasons. It was the latest in a string of attacks carried out in regions of Russia's unstable North Caucasus. In the first incident, a Russian policeman and his Chechen assailant were killed late Thursday in a shootout in Dagestan, after two men driving in a car opened fire on a police roadblock near the town of Kizilyurt. Late on Thursday, a bomb blew up close to an army vehicle near Nazran, the main city in the Ingushetia province, injuring two special forces soldiers. Another explosion blew up a goods train in North Ossetia. The blast may have been aimed at a passenger train meant to be passing at that moment. A third bomb, filled with metal shards, exploded near a Nazran courtroom, shattering windows in surrounding buildings. A mine also exploded as a military convoy passed through the village of Nesterovskaya in Ingushetia, but there were no victims, the official said. Then a Russian policeman was shot dead in his home by unidentified assailants in the southern region of Ingushetia also bordering Chechnya late on Friday. |
| Posted by:Dan Darling |